Making a choice

Prank Call

When she finally left the chat room and stood to explore what was, for all purposes, her new home, a loud chiming ringtone nearly made her jump out of her skin. She glanced down at the phone sitting on the couch and saw the profile picture of none other than 707 with his username flashing just above it on the screen. She could have declined the call, but curiosity won out as she lifted the device and tapped at the green icon below his image.

"...Hello..." She said awkwardly into the phone as she moved towards the kitchen.

"Rrrrrrrr. Rrrrrrrr." Was the reply she received, she pulled the phone from her ear and stared at it, puzzled as to what he was doing. When the phone was returned to it, he continued. "Uhm, uh... you're bank account has been used for a fun prank. Uh... were you aware of this? I must first verify your cell phone number for identification purposes, so please calmly follow the instructions." She wanted to laugh, was he being serious? He sounded like someone who had never prank called someone in his life. After a split second of thought on the subject, she clicked into the mindset she always used around her older brother.

"Oh my gosh!" She exclaimed, perhaps a bit too theatrically. "What should I do??? Do you want me to press my number? Or should I tell you? What prank was it?" Even though she knew he couldn't see her, she leaned against the counter of the kitchen dramatically and threw her arm over her eyes in a 'whatever will I do?' sort of way. There was a soft chuckle from his end of the phone, which softened her smile into one that she wouldn't normally show. His chuckle was cute.

"My gullible... I mean, good customer, please calm down." He began, pausing to correct himself along the way. "And take a deep breath. Breathe in - breathe out-!" She did as he instructed, being sure he could hear her over the phone and holding her laughter in to the best of her ability. "You must keep it together at a time like this. Now, if you've taken a deep breath-" She took another one a bit louder so he would hear that she had- "please go ahead and say 'honey, I love you-!" she frowned at his words but he wasn't done. "You know, like how the teddy bears say it." Teddy bears- oh, she remembered now. She sniggered softly as she moved the phone from her ear once more to stop him from hearing her. Where her mind went when he told her what to say would be something, she promised herself, she would never discuss.

"Honey, I love you-" She said sweetly into the phone, just like one of the bears off of the old comercial. Her words were followed quickly by his laughter.

"Hahahaha, good job." He praised through his chuckles. "Boy... you're so cute." She was stunned by these words but he was back in character now and continuing with the prank turned playful joking. "Now I will verify your phone number. Please tell me your number one by one. One- two-" She opened her mouth to speak when he suddenly shouted.

"....Stop!" the sound had her lips snapping closed once again. "You were about to tell me your number, weren't you? You can't do that! There are billions of scams like this going on right now!" the seriousness of his tone caused her to pause, it was just a joke wasn't it? She was playing along. Besides, he called her so he obviously had her number already. "From now on, just hang up if you receive a call like this - period. And if you're unsure whether it's a scam, just call me okay? I'll check for you even if I'm busy." She smiled a bit at this, he was worried about her being scammed. It was, sort of sweet. "But..." he brought her thoughts back to the present as he continued, "with Rika's apartment and all, you're so gullible!! You shouldn't fall for stupid things like this!" She wanted to rethort that she was just playing along because she knew it was him, but then again she didn't really know him so that was a moot point.

"I just called to check whether this is the right number. And you should be glad I was the one who called you. If this were real, a scary hacker could have taken all your money!" She had to admit his heart was in the right place at least, but he didn't seem to understand she played along with him for fun, and wasn't giving her an opening to correct him as he continued to quickly talk into the phone. "The moment you receive the call, you lose your money. Okay?" She rolled her eyes, this was becoming a lecture from basically a stranger, it was time to change that.

"Beep. Beep." She attempted to sound as robotic as possible. "We have detected criminal activity on your account..."

"What?! You managed to get into a hacker's account? That's bold!!!" He picked up on the fact she was trying to pull the conversation back into a playful one and thankfully followed along. "But!!! I don't really have a bank account. My boss told me cash was the best way to make money. Anyways, now that I checked your number. I'll let the other members know!" He went on to explain about how the calls work through the app, she hadn't even realized he called her through the app. He asked her to take care of the RFA and she gave a short affirmative noise in response. She still wasn't sure about it after all. By the time he was saying goodbye to her his voice was back into its playful candor that it held when she first answered his call. She smiled as she placed her phone on the counter, happy to have a friendly conversation after everything that happened that day.

A few hours later she had the apartment cleaned, learned that her job wasn't far away (which was a plus in her book as she would still need a source of income) and was throwing a load of dust filled clothes into the very nice washing machine when a thought struck her. Unknown had sent her there but then simply vanished after she entered the apartment, then she was thrust into this RFA business so quickly it made her head spin. What if Unknown was a hacker like 707? It was a possibility, though the question of why he did it still lingered in her mind. True she came out of it with a group of people to talk to and an apartment she wouldn't be able to afford if she saved her entire life, but there was something suspicious about it all.

The first night in the apartment was one spent hurriedly cleaning while trying to keep up with the RFA messages. They came in at odd hours, making new chat rooms and telling her their thoughts on her joining. She did the best she could to be polite to each of them, but with little sleep to go on she was beginning to grow frustrated at their alerts. The saving grace was when 707 decided to pop in to poke fun of someone or make a joke, she happily joined in on those and he seemed to like having someone to help him in his efforts. Still, he didn't stay on long, citing work as a reason to leave before popping off to who knows where. It made her feel a bit lonely at times, especially when him leaving triggered everyone else to. She was just getting to know them, so she felt like an outcast looking in without really being able to be one of them.